Welcome back to the second edition of "Friday Musings". Last week I gave you a run down on some of the new stuff on the site and also gave my top 3 picks for early season MVP. This week will be similar, but instead of MVP I am going to talk about a few rookies who have caught my eye. Let's get to it.

First off, here are the player profiles on our greatest players list that have been posted this week...

I know it is only two and a half weeks into the season, but that shouldn't stop us from talking about this year's crop of intriguing rookies. Here are three players who have stood out to me for various reasons...

1) Jayson Tatum, Boston CelticsLiving in St. Louis forces me to have a thoughtful opinion on Jayson Tatum. The basketball community here is very interested in his success and everyone speaks highly of him. I have to say, he has been excellent so far. The Gordon Hayward injury has forced him into more minutes and a bigger role than Boston may have wanted to give him, but he has taken the chance and run with it. I thought he might be a bit too much of a gunner to flourish in Brad Stevens' offense but he is picking his spots well.

2) Donovan Mitchell, Utah JazzAfter the summer league he had, hopes were understandably high for Donovan Mitchell in Utah. After a relatively slow start, he has picked it up and is now playing in crunch time for the Jazz. Mitchell looks equally comfortable with the ball and without it. He also threw down the nastiest put-back dunk of the last couple of seasons.

​3. OG Anunoby, Toronto Raptors OG fell to the Raptors, drafting at #23, due to a knee injury that scared most franchises. He has shown virtually no ill effects of that injury so far in the NBA. Teams usually don't expect the 23rd pick to make an immediate impact, but Anunoby has already shown that he can do pretty much everything a modern NBA wing needs to do to make it in the league. He isn't shooting very well from three or the field but he looks comfortable taking shots from deep and Toronto is trusting him with nearly 18 minutes per game already. The tools are all there, the numbers will come.

This week in P.E. we have been playing volleyball. These are middle schoolers so no one is particularly talented but the 8th graders can at least attempt to play the sport correctly. In my 8th grade boys class we have been playing a "king of the hill" style game with three separate teams. Two teams play to ten points and then the winner stays and team three then comes on. It is simple and keeps one team from sitting for too long. In one of our last games of the week one team was leading 9-8 with one of the more athletic kids serving for the game. The kid hit the serve hard to the middle and a quiet, un-athletic kid miraculously returned the serve, kicking off by far our longest rally of the day. The serving team eventually won with a shot down the line and when they realized it was in they celebrated like they had won an NBA title. All I could do was sit there and laugh.